Too Early for this Bullshit | Hey Look, It's David Brooks Thursday!

You ever get the feeling that David Brooks isn't really cut out to be a columnist? I always get the sense that he never knows what to write about; he just starts writing and eventually there are enough words on the paper to meet his contractual obligations.

Don't get me wrong, he's a talented writer, pretty good at allusions to points he may or may not believe in (you can never really be sure with that guy) and always manages to give his pieces the illusion of structure. But can anybody tell me what the point of any column is?

I'm not going to deconstruct it here, but take this mornings little masterpiece. He bookends his screed with a very Brooksian staple: Playing both sides of the fence, however supporting one side over the other while he heaps subtle sarcasm and false praise on the other. Today he begins and ends saying that he doesn't really like Bolton's style or foreign policy views, but it's those things he doesn't like that make Bolton a good pick for the UN.

What?

For the rest of the column Boy David proceeds to explain to us why the UN will never be what he implies it and it's Lefty supporters want it to be: World Government (Yikes! Run for the hills!)... He's also good enough to help us understand why such notions are pure fantasy... Huh? When was the last time any serious American politician championed the cause of setting up a World State... I think that might have been Lex Luthar from Superman VII who suggested that. I mean really, is this even an issue?

Brooks very helpfully lists numerically all the reasons World Government won't work. Second on his list is this idiotic statement:

we will never accept global governance because it inevitably devolves into corruption. The panoply of U.N. scandals flows from a single source: the lack of democratic accountability. These supranational organizations exist in their own insular, self-indulgent aerie.

Come again? Ever hear the name Tom DeLay?

Jesus! What is he talking about? This isn't limited to international organizations alone, Dave; corruption and existing in one's own "insular, self-indulgent aerie" seem to be the core modus operandi for Bush and the GOP establishment.

Read the whole mystifying thing for yourself.